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Kalanna Rai
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 Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 12:21 am Post subject: Eternal Wars- #10: Story Discontinued. |
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I've decided to put my novel on hold, turning it into book two in the series, it makes more sense that way, and letting all of you take a crack at helping me put together the basis of the first book. This is my full writing style so you'll have to bear through the intense discriptions and long winded explanations in certain places. Without further ado read on...
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The Eternal Wars Book One: Dagger, Spear, and Sword.
Chapter One: A Line in the Rock
The Void was a vast and empty place in which hung the Realms, like fragile bubbles suspeded in chill morning air. They swirled and circled and danced on their slender teathers, orbiting a patch of everything in the middle of this nothing. A place rich with beauty found nowhere else for this was her private domaine...her paradise.
Here lush forests of hard and soft woods grew peacefully inbetween the searing heat and blistering storms of the sandy, rocky deserts, and the chill, flat expanse of the arctic tundra. Thick rainforest jungles and the depths of the ocean vied for the attention of a million types of mountains, both craggy and rounded. It was a place of diversity, anything found anywhere could be found here and many things existed nowhere else but in the queer blending zones between sections.
It was a place in which any but it's creator, it's gentle guardian, quickly became lost...sometimes for ages too long. They would find themselves amused by the scamperings of Oslets in the small, bubbling waterfalls that traveled down from one smooth rock ledge to the next.
Enchanted eternally by the play of the lighted water against the jeweled tones of the small creatures' thick, silken pelts. Amused by their tiny, blunt, muzzles, their overly large leaf-shaped ears, their massive eyes that swirled in colors beyond discription, and their long, swishing tails with their fat brush-like bobs on the end. Yes one could watch them while mountains turned into pebbles and be none the wiser.
Rains came and went, even in the deserts and upon the oceans, and breezes travled where they will while strong winds would occasionally shake the great trees that provided life for all things, preditor and prey alike, who lived within this place. Their fruits fell freely to the soft, spongy turf that sent moss creeping up their ancient trunks and hanging, beard-like, from their massive, knarled branches.
Fruits as veried as any other diet, replacing the needs of hunting and killing as completely as the seed replaces the tree that falls. From some trees, like the majestic Fyrnnihuft, came the sweetest fruits, some round others a bent, squashy shape, some soft, others hard as nuts. From twisted bushes, the Qupitna cheif amoung them, came fruits that were, for all purposes, meat. Meat to be cooked and eaten as was wished, or drug away and chewed upon raw as the devourer preffered.
Flowers left their heavy scents, like a heady vintage, upon the ever shifting air, mixing in ways they would have no other place. Some had healing abilities, even though injuries were often seen to by the guardian hereself, while others calmed hurts of the soul by their very sight. It was truely a place of enchantment and wonder, a place of supreme peace and tranquility...and it was all thanks to her.
All one needed to do was look upward to see that there was no sun and no moon or stars. All the light that came when this sanctuary slept came from the pool that lay at it's heart, a pool made not of water but of Thread. Threads, power.
Every imaginable hue of color, and some that defy imagination, that any artist could ever wish for was here. Every texture that a spinner, a weaver, a crafter of fine cloth or clothing, could have ever set their clever fingers at achiving...it was here. And the sound, each Thread had to it a Tone, more tones than any musician could have ever dreamed of, and never a disharmony amoung them.
These Threads wound their way outward, nourishing the magical place and all, save the guardian, the creator, within it. They glowed and pulsed by night, lighting the whole of the creation with a soft, misty, eldrich light that seemed like nothing if not an invitation to lay down where you stood and sleep, untroubled, until the daylight returned.
Daylight. That all pervasive golden glow that set everything to life again. If the Threads nourished the paradise then it was the source of the glow that nourished the threads...it was her. You could crane your neck upwards in vain for eternity, for time passed not in this place, and never see the source of the light. For that you'd have to have her permission to approach, or she'd find you.
Now, as the golden light swept over every inch of the paradise, a soft humming augmented the rich symphony of the Threads. There, sitting on a smooth rock next to the pool, was the creature responsible for all of this richness, this splendor, this perfection. And she was troubled.
Her long scarlet hair, the hue of the blood-fire in a ruby's heart, with it's cinnimon lowlights and bright copper highlights, fell in flame-like waves to veil her massive eyes. Her eyes, in four shades of emerald they were. The darkest only a shade off black, the lightest a brilliant gem like the first leaves of spring. They raidiated spokes of blending color, always shifting yet ever staying the same, the most dominant feature of her slender, wedge shaped head and tapering face.
Her muzzle, with it's equine similarities, was slender and delicate seeming, her chin a bit pointed, giving her profile a beak-like apperance. Her skin, soft as silk, smooth as glass, supple as leather, harder than steel. It's shimmering surface was as jeweled and golden as sun light amber and as brilliantly raidiant and metallic as gold on a summers noon. Underneith it every muscle was like a steel cord, bunching and sharply defined in fitness, as they connected over bones harder than diamond and as pourus as our own.
Yet these bones held a secret more than marrow. In each of those little pours a solution would ebb and flow, causing her to become heavier or lighter as she wished, allowing the massive wings upon her back to function despite her size and lack of a keel bone. Instead she had a massive breast bone, big enough to sheild a man in battle, and muscles than ran over her shoulders, down her arms, along her sides, into her belly, down her back, and over her haunches, connecting, finally, with her tail.
Her tail was yet another marvel the skin upon it bearing a pattern like feathers while being long, supple, and whip-like. Then, with a sudden snap and an electric pulse in just the right muscle groups, the tail rearranged into a beautiful fan of feathers. Just like her massive wings, who's feathers could be a hard, interlocking shield, or a soft, downy brush to lift her into the air, massive wings that mantled far above her body and attached with a rotaing ball and socket joing to her back midway between her shoulders and her spine.
On her shoulders long spines of hardened, ivory bone jutted outward at an angle where they wouldn't interfer with her wing action while flying. Her shoulders were massive and lead to powerful upper arms that tapered into shapely forarms, not unlike those of a human, and into clever hands with three long fingers and an opposable thumb. The fingers were tipped in tiny, ebony-black claws that could suddenly extend to the length of her fingers as the skin pulled back and away turning into wicked crescent razors.
Her legs were long and four jointed, once at hip, once at the ever bent knee, once at the ever bent hock, and once at the ankle. They could fold tightly under her body, for pounces and leaps of unparalled power, or nearly straighten for an unimaginable running speed. Massive tendons ran from her ankles to her hocks, and her haunches were massive with rounded muscles. And even more surprising were her lack of true feet. From her ankle there jutted a small back claw, that could extened into a gripping back toe, and three long, strong toes that ran down from there, ending in long recractable claws.
The skin of the soles of her feet, same as on the palms of her hands, was like sandpaper, it gripped on the slickest surfaces with narey a sound save a soft whisper. She could not loose her footing even on the sheerest of mountains, the smoothest of rocks, or the slickest of ice. Her chest, concealing massive lungs, was shapley and curved, giving a feminen impression while remaining as strong and fortified as the rest of her body. Especially the crest on her head.
Five long, razor sharp blades ran from just between her eyes on her raised, gently sloaping forehead, to the curve where her skull attached to her graceful, curving neck. The first was long, a good couple of feet, the second as long as her head, while the fifth, and smallest, was only six inches long. Fangs of ivory poked out from under her upper lip, three deadly pairs gleaming and sharp.
She was, as she herself put it, a being of peace built for war. Yet now, as she flicked her two massive, delicate ears, which were only slightly larger than her eyes and given to a teardrop shape, or that of a man's palm, back in worry. There was a problem, a disharmony in the Threads for the first time ever.
Her light flickered in anxiety, reflecting in the depths of the dark gem, that seemed to be every color and no color at once, at her throat. It was her only orniment, her cloths being only a plain top of light, soft black leather, and a loincloth-like skirt of the same. At her side, a massive warsword sat, blade sunk to the hilt in the rock.
Now, as she peered into the depths seeking the source of the conflict, she spoke in clear, bell-like tones to the sword. "Well Rath it's as I feared. The Twins are arguing again. I fear that soon things will come to blows between them and then..." She sighed.
Next to her in the earth the massive senient sword crackeled with violet energy. From its gold chased silver quillions and guards, to the pair of massive amythests, one as the pommel jewel the other set into the sword just above the point where it sank into the rock, about a third down the full length of the blade. It sparked out to her, reassuring that should war indeed be the answer that she would not need to go alone. That she would always have the unnaturally sharp, razor edge of it's blade by her side.
With a distracted smile Kalanna Rayker, the Rai Incarnation, or as she preferred, the simple Incarnation of Time, patted the massive pommel jewel. "They're coming." She stood to her full height, twenty-one feet not including blades, and drew Rath from the rock, slinging it easily into a scabbard that wove itself into existance along her spine. The blade purred like a cat, reassuring her once again that she was right. "I know, I just wish this wasn't so hard."
Slowly, still shaking off the effects of their travel through her paradise, the other two eternal incarnates came into view. The first, the twin who had chosen to look like the male equivilant of Kalanna, was covered from head to toe in a shimmering fall of light, obscuring his features from view. A massive golden spear, chased and tassled in pure light, was gripped tightly in his left hand. Kalanna inclined her head to him. Rocorr, Incarnation of Light, Paitence, and Good.
Right on his heels his twin brother, though he barely looked anythign alike having chosen a far different form, came cloaked in deepest night, leaving nothing to be seen but darkness. A massive bronze dagger hung from a skin belt scabbard at his waist and he moved like one ready to commit great harm. Kalanna inclined her head to him also. Yassil, Incarnation of Jealousy, Madness, and Evil.
"You know why we have come." It was not a question but a statement, a bold fact. Yassil's voice was a sibilant whisper that rubbed Kalanna wrongly.
"Yes. I know the question you've both come to ask. And here is my answer." She slowly held out one hand. "Once, long ago, you both came to me and asked me to make you what I am, Incarnates, instead of being content with being Gods. And I allowed you to dip your hands into the Thread and come away with whatever would have you. I gave freely of myself that you might be my equals."
Rocorr coughed slightly. "Kalanna I understand that this is hard..." She turned toward him and with a very final gesture she turn her palm face downward.
"It's not difficult for me, my answer. I say no. No to both of you. I see neither as being any fitter, any better, than the other. The purpose, all those years ago, of making you into Incarnations was to make you equal. Now you have found something else to war over...me. I will not be party to your squabbles as I favor neither of you above the other. You either must accept that or you must dwell upon it as you choose but darken not the doorway of my home again with such nonsense."
For a moment she had hopes that her speech would work...but only for a moment. Then the scales tipped and the future she'd tried so desperately to avoid swung into full view, shoving the other future to that place of 'might have been'. The brother's turned on each other and said in one voice. "It's your fault. What did you do to her?"
The spear swung to the ready, the dagger came free of the belt, and Kalanna was left with little choice. Drawing Rath she swung the mighty blade in between them. "Then is it to be war!" Two hooded head's grimly nodded assent. "With tears standing in her eyes Kalanna completed the vicious swing, sending the brothers far from her home, to opposite sides of her pet realm...Iylsidor.
"Come Rath. We must do what we can to repair this folly." Yet what could be done? Surely she must warn her people, the espiri of the impending war. Yet her apperance amoung them might spark a great panic. She wondered, should she travel as herself or as a simple warrior who had dreamed, perhaps, that some great calamity was upon them? Her vision, troubled by the involvment of the brothers, was of no use to her now. She would have to rely on her own judgement.
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Well? What should she do?
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"It's not just about living forever...the trick is living with yourself forever..."
"Music makes you braver."
Last edited by Kalanna Rai on Sat Dec 01, 2007 1:24 am; edited 17 times in total
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Chinaren
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| Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 1:01 am Post subject: |
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Interesting Start oh Raily one. I enjoyed it except for the many typos! Do you write in Word? It would fix at least some of them for you, or highlight them anyway.
Mmm, I think she should travel as herself where she can, but slip into a little disguise when needed.
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| Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 5:57 am Post subject: |
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Hmm. An interesting read. I agree with china. Few typos that can be easily caught by a word processor spell check. If I have any other suggestions, I will post again.
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Chinaren
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| Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 3:43 pm Post subject: |
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| lordofthenight wrote: | | Another story then Rai - tut tut, discrasful |
Yes, she is catching me up! 
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| Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 3:55 pm Post subject: |
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F5 china. There doesn't need to be some reason to be the worrywart of the story yet about some calamity. Stay simple, and don a disguise when needed.
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Kalanna Rai
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| Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 9:34 pm Post subject: |
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Actually guys...everything I post on this site is straight written right then, right there....All I do inbetween posts is kick around ideas, conversations, bits and pieces of the whole but nothing close to what eventually gets typed.
Sorry for all the typos but I don't actually have any programs like Word on my PC. Notepad I have but nothing else.
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| Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 9:41 pm Post subject: |
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You could download Star Office, which is Sun's free office suite. It is supposed to be pretty good, and it is free!
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| Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 9:46 pm Post subject: |
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Takes all the fun out of it...
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| Posted: Sun Apr 09, 2006 10:09 pm Post subject: |
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Poll's up, votes needed.
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| Posted: Sun Apr 09, 2006 10:25 pm Post subject: |
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Voted, and better be winning. 
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| Posted: Thu Apr 13, 2006 11:10 am Post subject: |
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So, Rai. You going to write the next chapter? Three votes toward the last option.
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| Posted: Fri Apr 14, 2006 10:49 pm Post subject: |
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Be prepared for a long chapter...I'm actually thinking these things out before hand...Oh and by the way...I'm referring to her as Rayker just to keep confusion to a min...
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Chapter Two: The Warmonger Cometh
Rayker sighed, a sound mournful and lost, and stared at the paradise around her. Slowly she sang, a lullabye long remembered by her people, a song of hope and sadness and joy for tommorrow. Sang in the Tones of Threads it was universally understandable, universally appealing.
It wound through every leaf and bow, dropping like a gentle rain to caress the ears of the creatures that frolicked in her home. It diffused through the ocean, like a drop of golden water in an emerald sea, winding it's way into every scale, fin, and wafting reed. Where it touched, sleep came, a dormancy unbreakable, the endless sleep that would last until Rayker woke them...or until Time ended.
Slowly, as her light dimmed like a setting sun, she finished her song on a clear strong note. As it faded, reverberating in echo's until even it stilled in the heavy air, a tear gently threaded it's way down Rayker's amber muzzle to splash, with a gentle note, into the pool of Thread. "Light them well in slumber my friends. I known not when I shall return unto you but I know it shall not be soon."
The Thread's twisted, their odd, faint light the only illumination in the paradise, and from them lifted a light traveling cloak. With a wavering smile Rayker plucked the gift from their grasp. The Thread might be a part of her, spun from the essence of her own self, yet at times it seemed to be something alien and foreing unto her.
She fastened the cloak on over her sparse clothing, having never been one much for ostentatious displays of fabric, and fastened it with the slender toggle made, it seemed, from carved bone of a creamy hue. Hefting Rath's massive, yet insignificant, weight she commanded the blade into it's usual resting place. Within that same heartbeat, a pair of amythests set in silver seemed to grow from the skin on the backs of her hands.
With a last look around, like any good home owner who knew they'd be gone a long time, Rayker took one last look around her paradise. A sense of foreboding swept over her and her eyes grew sharp and hazy as she probed the future with her vision. It was twisted, warped, and cracked like a mirror that had been in a great heat. A plethora of futures sprang about before her eyes, like the flickering of a candle flame.
She hated this, the brother's involvment. It made it impossible to keep the future in a nice, straight chain of events. She'd given them the gift of existence outside of Time. That meant that when they were directly involved in momentous occurrences, like this war for dominence, she couldn't see one nice tidy future because it was ever shifting with possibilities. It made her head ache trying to keep all the senarios straight.
But it wasn't the many senarios that made her grow cold in anger and apprehension. It was the fact that she never returned to her paradise directly in any of the futures. "So I'm going to..." She couldn't die...knew that with a certanty that not even Yassil and Rocorr could claim. She was too strong, too powerful. If anyone tried to destroy her, the only possible way it could be done, they were in for one nasty surprise.
The amythests glowed with warm, violet fire and gave small purring noises as reassurance. Rayker stroked them absently, rubbing her hands together. "Yes I know. We must be going but..." But lingering here wasn't going to change the futures for the better. The brother's knew she wasn't going to sit idle while they tore the Realms out from under her feet.
Drawing her cloak tight about her she opened the door to the realm she called her 'pet'...Iylsidor. She dropped through the fabric of space and Time, a strange sensation for her since she was the physical incarnation of Time, landing in the middle of a sun-soaked plain.
All around her grasses waved in imitation of the sea. Emerald and amber stalks surrounded by hints of lime, yellow-green, goldenrod, and dusky saffron. They rippled, flashing, in the warm breeze that smelled of the east from whence it came, the sharp, cold odors of mountain ridges and alpine medows, of frost, snow, and lost loved ones caught in the high passes. Her cloak flapped around her and she squinted upwards at the azure sky.
White clouds, tinted light green by the small 'sister' suns that cirled their 'mother'. Their was a tale behind them, just as there was a tale behind every hillock and hollow in the region. It was in the nature of the espiri to tell beautiful tales...just as it was to create beautiful art and use a beautiful language. Her people, the one race she'd created in her own image, although that hadn't been her idea at the time, were a people of beauty and peace.
And trained for war. The grim thought flitted across her mind before she could stop it. But it was true. When she'd first wove them from Thread spun specially for the occasion, she may have left out a few of her more 'martial' features but she'd given them a hefty dose of military sense. They had the head for stratagy, tactics, and in battle their normally hot passion burned a fridgid cold that kept them well grounded.
Her people could take care of themselves better than any other race out there. A single espiri, armed correctly, could easily kill a dragon, although no dragons existed in Iylsidor and thus that particular race war was spared. She prided herself on their toughness which co-existed symbiotically with their beauty and seeming fragility. They were each a well made blade, beautiful and deadly, gleaming with precious jewels or simply well made. Balanced and clean-lined...and they were hers.
Her lip curled as she thought of the Brothers. She didn't know who she despised more, Yassil or Rocorr. Sure one might have all the bad traits while the other had all the good, but one had imagination, creativity, while the other could only make half-hearted attempts at improving what someone else had already made.
Take Yassil. He hadn't wanted to look the same as his brother and Rayker so he had fashioned himself into a new creature, had made a race in his image...the ydross. Most, including her own race, thought them ugly, misshapen espiri made because their creator was unwilling to create anything new. Yet the two races, for all their similarities, could not be more different.
One was highly adaptable, readily accepting new ideas and creating new, beautiful, useful things. The other was hidebound by tradition and religious zealotry, a race of warriors constantly honeing their battle-craft. One had feathers with which they expressed many things in little flicks or fidgits. The other had long bony spines and strips of flesh, connected by leather that was full of beautiful and brilliant colors. One had been created by War, the other by Madness.
Yet Rocorr had chosen to look like Rayker herself, changing only a few things here and there. His muzzle was a little more blunted, his frame a little more stocky, his feathers a little more rounded giving his wings a blunt look. His blades, instead of facing edge out in line, were more like shields with a long surface face and sharp outer edges. Most assumed this was because he was male yet none of the espiri looked as he did.
Rath gave a small chirrup, gaining her attention again. "Yes I'm traveling as myself." It chirruped again. "No, I do have a backup plan. If the situation seems to call for it Kalanna Rayker will vanish to be replaced by Kala Rykeira, a warrior from the Frontier." The sword settled again, the gems glowing only with sunslight.
She pulled the hood up over her face and turned her nose to the wind, smelling more than what it would have told any normal traveler. Trouble was brewing on the real Frontier, the espiric armies were already beginning to mass. Seers are certainly earning their keep this time. Her humor faded as she realized that she herself was little more than a Seer.
She might be able to predict certain events without any margin for error but with this much strain on the Fabric of Time...who knew. Already the strain was beginning to build in her muscles, a dull ache that wouldn't go away until this whole, bloody, conflict was resolved. Her wings twitched in irritation. "I'm going to need a long, hot, soak after this one..."
Slowly she scanned the horizion...she was alone without another living creature for a great many miles. The grasses waved invitingly around her hips, nearly begging her to walk not fly. Overhead the sunslight was warm, gentle, and inviting..."To archers as well..." She set off with brisk strides...her long legs swishing through the grasses, her toes picking out sure footing each time, tail like a rudder, swirling the grasses behind her and sweeping any trace of her tracks into oblivion...
She nearly bounded in joy, to be free and ufettered, running alone in the warm sunlight with the breeze turning her scarlet mane into a blood banner, a rebel yell for autumn in this summer landscape. She laughed and the grasses around her burst into flower, praire flowers blossoming from their secret beds amoung the grasses.
The petals came free as she swiftly passed them and soon she had a fragrant wind of lavander, pink, sky blue, creamy white, sherbet orange, and butter yellow trailing in her wake, like an extention on her cloak. Her gaze fixed itself on the horizion, seeing yet unseeing as her destination drew ever closer.
Mychranrai, the Seat of Kings...Yet, even as she skimmed along light-footed, the trouble brewing on the Frontier reached out to wrap icy tendrils of war around her heart. She stopped dead in her tracks, the wind of flowers behind her catching up, swirling for a moment, then falling like a sunset snow around her. Storm clouds gathered over her head, brought perhaps by her swift flight, or perhaps by her dismal thoughts.
She was torn, with two choices of equal merit, two situations demanding her attention. "Noco destrius mocoli nurputim amolae." Which roughly translated means 'Without honor, hope, or home go I....But where was she going to go...
-------------------------
What will you do?
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 5:09 pm Post subject: |
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It wasn't that long, Rai.  Hmm. I can't really decide on where to go. Actually, I don't see the two choices we do have. One is the Seat of Kings, but what is the other?
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Kalanna Rai
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| Posted: Sat Apr 22, 2006 5:26 pm Post subject: |
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You can go to Mychranrai or the Frontier or in the direction of the greatest trouble...or anywhere else you tell me to go save Hell...
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| Posted: Sun Apr 23, 2006 11:12 am Post subject: |
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Vote now please.
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| Posted: Sun Apr 23, 2006 3:29 pm Post subject: |
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Need to add some spice to the story. Voted.
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| Posted: Mon Apr 24, 2006 4:34 am Post subject: |
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Looks like all three of us want some trouble.
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| Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 2:26 pm Post subject: |
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Right...trouble...
------------------
Chapter Three: A Simple Warrior
Limirrius was surrounded by them, what seemed like a thousand ydross slavers to his befuddled brain. That powder...what was in that powder... His reflexes were slowing...slowing...dragging toward the point of non-existence...And suddenly she was there.
Over the knoll of waving grass that blocked the slavers' caravan from sight came a whirling storm of flower petals. They danced and fell and rose again as a figure lept over the knoll and came down on the slavers like a bolt from the skies above. Three went down under her feet, one never to rise as the force of her landing crushed his skull like an egg, spilling his mind over the loam benieth them.
The other two, spattered with bit's of thought, tried to stand but were forced back into the dirt by the sheer strength contained in the newcomer's arms. They flailed a bit before going still as the soft dirt invaded their lungs, driving the air before it. The other slavers, some still fighting with Limirrius, some simply stunned by the sudden appearence of this specter of death, now turned en-mass toward the cloaked warrior.
She moved with leathal grace and deadly efficiancy, not one movement spared the task of unleashing pain on her opponants. Each strike timed just so, each blow delivered in just a certain way, the fight was over before it had begun. Blood filled the small hallow they stood in, the soft ground unable to absorb so much blood at once. As the last slaver fell, Limirrius stood and raised his sword in a warriors salute...before toppling from the poison's that crept, like theives and phantoms through his veins.
For a moment all was still as flower petals rained out of a clear sky to cover the slowly drainin crimson lake, that was congealing around the feet of the cloaked warrior, soaking into her traveling cloak's hem. Tenderly she knelt down to where Limirrius lay atop the bodies of the slain, bloody and delirious, slowly inching toward death from which only an antidote could save him. The ear's on the warrior twitched as she brough one slim hand down upon his brow.
A warm golden glow, remniscent of sunlight on a summer day, honey sticky on one's fingers, a lump of amber rolled, sparkling in the firelight, of home and hearth and kindred arms spread over his body. Slowly the poison was chased from his system, fleeing before the light of it's distruction, like the mist of early morning rising from the dew-damp grass.
When she could find neither wounds nor poison, she lefted Limirrius, though he easily weighed as much as she and could not lesson the load for her, and carried him in her arms away from this place of reeking death and distruction. The flower petals remained...covering the bodies of the fallen like a silent blanket, forgiving them their evils and sending them on their final rest.
---------------------------
Limirrius woke to the sound and warmpth of a fire at his back and the smells of a cook working their special brand of magic. He opened his eyes to see only the nightscape of a clear night on the Secranilia plains. Stars, like small winks of waterdrop light on a stretched canvas of ocean depths, danced in their storied patterns, tales they told changing with every season and every telling. Their little lanterns of light delighting children and saving ships around the whole of the nighttime world.
The grasses played the soft tunes of the night as a quiet breeze strolled, like young lovers, through every stalk and stem, telling all that no danger threatened itself in unharmonious rustlings. This was one of those nights..."You can almost hear the Threads of the World on a night like this."
"If you listen hard enough." He had almost forgotten his companion until she spoke. Her voice conjured many things to mind, resonated on so many levels of being that he was sure the stars themselves heard her. Limirrius had once been told that the King could talk a bird out of the trees and his own impressions of the man did nothing to dissuade this image. Yet the female behind him was as far above the king as the king was above Limirrius.
Slowly, his muscles tired but not sore, he turned and sat across the fire from his savior. Firelight is a strange thing. It can make people look beautiful beyond belief by hiding those slight imperfections. It can lend mysterious beauty with it's golden-orange light ever dancing across skin and skein. Or it can terrify and demonize as the shadows elongate and the eyes sparkle darkly in a face set to frighten, pulling it into a grotesque grimace.
Yet it did none of these for the warrior. It poured across her, as steady as sunlight as drenching as water, reflecting off her skin until she had a cirrus of firelight about her that clung and twisted and magnifed her perfect beauty. Limirrius had always considered his Elmilissa the most beautiful creature ever...now he had to rethink that statement.
"What did you say?" Her eyes were wide and warmly lit with a gentle inner flame, her soft ears twitched outward a bit in the manner of relaxation. A gentle smile curved half her mouth.
"I said you can hear the Threads of the World tonight." A spark of sadness flared deep withing the noble countenance, a flaw in a moment of perfect stillness. "But all you will hear from them is the music of the end." Limirrius flicked his ears a bit the message clear, i do not understand. The warrior stirred the flames under the battered kettle with her talons, her eyes scrying the flame depths for some secret unpossessable.
"A great battle is soon to unfold over this land, spreading over from the homes of our kindred and beloved friends and into the worlds as yet unknown. Even now the Eternal One's rush to take their positions, gather their armies, and draw their battle lines." Limirrius's body language again said much, in the flicking of ears, the twitching of tail and feathers, while he said nothing.
The warrior was still with only the set of her shoulders, wings, and ears, that dead spark deep in her eyes that was nearly lost amoung their natural glow, to tell him that this news was for her, a heavy burden to bear. She looked from the fire to him, staring into his eyes as if to scry an answer within him. She did not find whatever she was looking for. "I know you wonder how this is and how it came to pass. You are certain in your knowledge that She shall intervene before any great damage is done. Now I must cast even that certainty to doubt."
She turned her attention momentarily to the kettle over the fire. She extended her talons to gently life the scalding hot lid off the now red bellied kettle. She lifted her other hand, a long, polished, much used, much loved wooden spoon held as deftly in it as one might hold an artists brush or a quilled pen. She dipped it into the thick, rich liquid within the pot, each circular stirr sending clouds of fragrant steam to torment his battered senses.
His mouth watered like a starving man's might as the warrior concentrated on the contents of the pot. "What is happening in Iylsidor now is much like what is happening in this soup pot. The right ingredients have been added to the right kettle at the right time, the right fire at the right temperature lit underneith it, now all that remains is to see what hand holds the spoon. Under the control of one the stew might be underdone, another boil it into a tough paste." She took the spoon out and let a small dollop of liquid drizzle onto her talon.
She tasted it, savoring it as only one who truly knows food can, before closing her eyes and smiling. She set the lid at an angle on the kettle, allowing the steam to escape and picked up two wooden bowls from where they sat on a blanket in the grass. Slowly she ladled two large portions into the bowls and pulled, from amoung the cinders, two ash cakes of light and fluffy texture.
She handed him one bowl, one cake, and a spoon and watched his first few bites. "This is very good...very good." She nodded and took a bite herself before returning her intense gaze and serious manner upon him once again.
"And in the hands of one who knows the true nature of that which is in the pot...you will get something better than all of that which went in." For a few moments they ate in a silk delicate, velvet soft silence, stopping only to refill their bowls. Finally, appitite sated and sleep closing in upon him, Limirrius looked again at the warrior who had saved his life.
"I think I understand...I will help you." She smiled and clasped his hand.
"Limirrius," He started as she spoke the name he hand not told her. "I am Rayker. We are well met..." He watched as she packed up her things and put them into several packs that seemed to vanish...magic...into the night. So many questions burned on his lips, each trying to force it's way beyond it's companions...
---------------
What dose he ask?
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Ravenwing
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| Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 4:17 am Post subject: |
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What Lordy said. Also what does she mean by "we are all met?" Do do what exactly?
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Kalanna Rai
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| Posted: Fri Apr 28, 2006 7:28 pm Post subject: |
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Sorry...I could have sworn I already replied to this comment...but here goes...
First the comment was 'We are well met.' That is a traditional Espiric greeting...thankfully I didn't write it in it's archaic form like I did a privious statement she made. All she ment was that they'd gotten off to a good start...or did she mean more?
Maybe that's the question he should ask because believe me Rave...there are a few more important people they've got to run across before they are 'all met'. And you guy's will be deciding all that too so keep reading...
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| Posted: Sat Apr 29, 2006 4:16 pm Post subject: |
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That question at the bottom, thats the descion point, no? Am I allowed to vote or do you have to give me permission? This is a awesome story by the way but just a teensy weensy small correction...
It's does.
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| Posted: Sat Apr 29, 2006 8:52 pm Post subject: |
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| Kalanna Rai wrote: | Sorry...I could have sworn I already replied to this comment...but here goes...
First the comment was 'We are well met.' That is a traditional Espiric greeting...thankfully I didn't write it in it's archaic form like I did a privious statement she made. All she ment was that they'd gotten off to a good start...or did she mean more?
Maybe that's the question he should ask because believe me Rave...there are a few more important people they've got to run across before they are 'all met'. And you guy's will be deciding all that too so keep reading... |
Actually I was very much reminded of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. Two scenes in that play actually.
Oberon's "Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.
AND
Peter Quince's "Are we all met?"
And yeah, you said it. I was wondering if there was more meaning in her words.
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| Posted: Sat Apr 29, 2006 10:07 pm Post subject: |
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Welcome to my corner of insanity Darke and yes it's sort of a trademark with me to spell dose wrong...or is that does? I think I've mentioned that a few times.
And yes, the question at the bottom is the DP. You just think of a question you'd like Limirrius to ask Rayker and I'll put it in the poll. Depending on the question he asks the story has multiple twists and turns it could take...and you've only met two of the five heros...but I've already given too much away...
And yes Rave...there's quite a bit of meaning behind her seemingly traditional greeting...there's usually quite a bit behind anything this particular character says and does, did I get it right that time?.
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| Posted: Tue May 02, 2006 8:32 pm Post subject: |
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I think so.
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 1:23 am Post subject: |
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And I hit a third...how long will my luck hold! Make voting magic for me oh readers of IF!
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| Posted: Wed Sep 27, 2006 1:27 pm Post subject: |
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A dark shadowy figure imerges from the shadows, drops a note and is gone. The note reads
Excellent detail, equistite illustrations, long but not tedious by a long shot. Keep it going, Kalanna, I sense in this the bases for a saga.
I can't wait to see how this ends and look forward to many more interesting chapters in this storygame.
Until later, I lurk in the shadows...
This note has been signed,
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| Posted: Mon Oct 02, 2006 5:13 pm Post subject: |
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Thanks Din. If you keep reading then S.T.S.G. is working. Enjoy...
--------------------------
Chapter Four: Questions and Answers
"Who are you?" Limirrius could barely force the words from his lips. He knew, in his heart of hearts he knew he was talking to someone special. Rayker...the name meant something. Yet his companion only smiled.
"I am the ephermial traveler, the one who you shall cross paths with again and again but shall never be the wiser of. You move within my grasp, waking and sleeping as I ease by. You mesure my stride by the track of the sun and the spinning cycles of the moons. The drops of water which fall, or the grains of sand you collect." She turned that emerald gaze upon him again and smiled. "Sleep. Ponder my riddle in the morning."
Limirrius suddenly felt tired beyond measure. Against their will his eyelids drooped ever lower before falling shut. He tried once to open them and could not. Tried again and...
------------------------
Dawn had come, bringing bird song like a morning breeze, rustling the grasses with their sibilent whispers. Rayker stood, head turned to the Mother sun, her crest glowing brilliant amber fire in the first light. Limirrius stood, feeling well rested as if a soft bed had been beneith him not hard ground. Rayker turned, inclining her head to him, and extended a round cake which he took with a nod. "Dawn's greeting. I am sorry for the haste but you must break your fast on the foot this morning."
Taking a bite of the cake, it proved to be sweet honey-grain pressed with star berries, flower berry juice, and topped with sea sugar. A rare treat for a soldier even one as high of standing as Limirrius was. Yet Rayker seemed to be full of surprises. Seeing his enjoyment she extended another. Unable to help himself Limirrius took the proffered cake with child-like sense of glee. It had been too long a time since simple things like this could give him a measure of comfort.
Rayker turned and began bounding toward the rising sun, the east. Only the wilds of the Frontier lay in that direction. Wrapping his cloak tighter around him, though it did no good once the winds caught hold of it, he bounded after her. Still chewing his first cake, second held lightly in his hand, he came up along side her.
"Rayker
"Ker please...or Kal if you must."
"Rae. I can only wonder at your methods. Would it not be better to fly if there is need for such haste?" Rayker's eyebrows had gone up when he'd adressed her in such a formal way. Rae had three meanings. One was a term for a female beloved, another an expression of respect for a female, the last amounted to the highest use of Lady. It was in the third sense he'd used it.
"I am indeed hasty to reach the Frontier but not so hasty I would have a Ydross arrow in my ribs." Involuntarily Limirrius's eyes ran over Kal's skin, taking in the rich golden tones of it. There wasn't a scar to be seen marring the perfect skin and, after he'd seen her own prowess in battle for himself, Limirrius realized she had the highest honor that could ever be given to any warrior...the honor of being Unmarked.
They ran on not speaking but not in silence. Every sound of nature seemed to communicate it's self to Kal and she directed their course around it. Limirrius knew nothing on that depth. He knew when something was wrong from the stillness, or wrong because everything had been desturbed, but not the little changes in natures melody.
Right now they ran with the wind, and the wind sang to them. It sang in the swishing hush of the grasses and flowers they passed, in the whispers and whistles of rocks and gullies. Overhead the sky was clear without even the gauziest whisps of clouds, like some great crystal dome over head. The Mother sun a great jewel of honeyed light circled by her daughters that winked like Kal's eyes.
The wind had shifted, coming from the south today. It smelled of hot desert sands and tropical jungles full of life and decay, of baked earth and alkali flats, and bones of foolish travelers slowly roasting for the carrion birds. He liked this omen naught and his stride faltered, a claw catching in the roots of the grass and throwing him as the strands held an instant too long.
Kal flicked an eye back to him her stride clipping a fraction, pace slightly slowed. "Would you like a rest Limirrius?" He shook his head, hair the color of a night sea rippling at the movement. She nodded but slowed anyway, until they were walking through the grass. They made a gentle noise, not uncommon to the dances native to this region, as the grasses parted for them like eddies of water. Their cloaks were bouyed on the tops of the stalks, spreading like pools of waving water behind them.
"Why are you going to the Frontier Rae?" She looked at Limirrius with an appraising eye. He knew what she saw physically. She saw an espiri male in the prime of his life. Not quite as tall as she was but with a longer crest so they appeared of even hight. His eyes were less almond shaped and slightly smaller, a deep amber in hue with deep rings of golden brown spiking through them.
His hair was a deep purple, the color of sorrows and storm clouds, of deep ocean waters or the crests of night waves. He was broader of shoulder, and had a flatter, deeper chest. His wings lacked her shapely form and his torso was longer and thicker, leading to narrower but just as powerful haunches. His legs were sturdier and shorter, his toes a little more splayed and claws slightly duller.
His tail was less whiplike but still flexible, his arms like those of a blacksmith. His hide was deep black, so black the highlights seemed to be purple and blue, like oil on water, iridescent and shimmering, his wings just as black and tipped in darkest blue, the blue of broken hearts. His crest blades were not turned to the profile, the sharp edge out like hers were, but were flat and broad like a sheild, though just as sharp on the point and edge.
His muzzle was not rounded like hers, more streamlined and sharp instead, and his ears were set a little higher on his head. His hair was cut short, long in the bangs but tapering to little more than a fringe just behind his forth, and last spine.
But he had the sense she was looking beyond that, seeing into the weave of him, of his very soul. He couldn't fathom what she saw there, he was no mystic, he was little enough a mage. Yet he had given his sword to her aid, as long as their paths coincided. Finally she turned that pulsing gaze away from him, freeing him from her spell.
"The Frontier is another day's run away yet and we have traveled for half of this one. That dark smudge there is the mountains of the Boarder. What I want to know is what the Ydross were doing a weeks march into our lands...and what the king's premier General is doing alone and besiged in the middle of nowhere." Limirrius turned to her, blade already dancing in his hands.
"Whoever you are you tread on dangerous ground. The matters you probe are not your concern."
"Put the blade away Limirrius, threats are ill suited to you. If I'd wished you harm should I have just waited for the Ydross poison to take you, or let the slavers drag you away. I'm just as concerned about these matters as you are, and I'm in a position to offer great help."
He looked at her through narrowed eyes. She was mysterious, had answered few of his question, if any at all, and spoke in riddles as often as not. Yet she was a warrior of great skill and she seemed to possess great wisdom. "You should meet the king, come with me and I'll gain you entrence."
She shook her head. "I thought of speaking to the king, indeed could have been there days ago, but I was directed to aid you. You were in great danger and in need of my help, so I came. Now we are closer to the Frontier than we are to Mychranrai so I shall continue and see if I can solve any of the problems there before I confront the king with more woes to add to his burden."
Limirrius could see the sense in that and when Kal turned and begain to run again he followed without hesitation. Her light cloak flowed behind her, like the Thread of the wind made tangible, snapping a merry tune in counter point to his own cloak of fine woven yurra cloth.
--------------------------
Night had come and the rest of the previous evenings stew had been eaten. Limirrius lay with a full belly and a lazy mind. Yet he could not sleep easy, the meaning of the riddle churned over and over in his mind. The key to her identity lay in his lap if he could but decipher it.
With a disgusted bah he put it away. Such was the realm of the king's Riddle master not Limirrius. He was a stratigist, a Tacticion, a General and leader of men. He was not good at puzzles.
A few yards away Rayker had turned her face to the mountains, listening to their certain song of reaching upward while the world wore them down. She listened to the echos of every footstep that had ever touched their surface, the sure scrubbing of the wild winds aginst their sides, sharpening their peaks.
And through it all the thread of dissonance rang...the tone of war. Tomorrow they would reach the first settlements of the Frontier, and the first crossroad. She could already see it in her mind, a left fork and a right fork.
One would bring them to a large fort fairly quickly, the other would take them to the Front lines themselves, the ongoing war with the Ydross. She would ask Limirrius in the morning what he knew of each place but she was loath to wait that long. She could peer into the future but everything surrounding anything was so uncertain she might get nothing of use at all.
The question remained, should she wait, or make up her mind now. And if she made up her mind...which way did she go?
--------------------------
The Dp is up, have fun.
_________________
"It's not just about living forever...the trick is living with yourself forever..."
"Music makes you braver."
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dinranwen
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| Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2006 11:32 am Post subject: |
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*The shadowy form of the cloaked and hooded Woman called Din, sneaks in and smiles, adressing the author personally rather than her usual handing off a note before disappearing*
Another interesting chapter, Dragoness, I expected as much when I saw a new chapter out for this rather detailed story. For the Dp, it is difficult to decide what is best when a country stands at war and the future filled with a thousand possibilites as many as the souls that can either be killed, hurt, or saved in a single day of battle.
Foretelling is a great gift, but used too often it can have the potential to show what is best not seen or making it's user so dependent of it that they cease looking at the present altogther and see only the fragements of possibilties that future can be. However, I do not think that this shall be Raykers fate, and incarnation of time, she should be as comfortable in both the past and future as she is in the present.
Nevertheless, because the future is so uncertain, so broken that time itself awaits anxesily (Sp?) for what is next, it is probably best to leave of foreseeing the future and wait. Ask the warrior in the morning if you must, the future is doubtful to trust.
Both path pose a danger to the heros of this story, and the time lost in waiting could be critical and be enough to sway the future one way or the other.
I think however, there is a third option however. Don't ask the warrior, who if even asked might not be well informed of the current state of either destination but ask nature.
This whole chapter Rayker has been listening to the woods, letting them guide her through the world. Why not do so now?
That however is only my suggestion.
I'll be waiting in the shadows until poll can be seen.
*Smiling, Din slips into the nearest corner and disappers into the shadows once again.*
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Crunchyfrog
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| Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2006 3:05 am Post subject: |
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This is beautifully written, the detail has conjured up some wonderful imagery here for me.
I would only add one suggestion, and that is to be consistent with Rayker's name - it has shifted several times, there has been Kal, Rayker, Rae, Kalanna. Maybe stick to two, i.e., what she is referred to in the narrative, and what Limirrus and others call her.
Whether to wait, or make up her mind to go to the fort or the frontier now?
That's a difficult one. She's been described as a physical incarnation of time - so presumably she's got some feeling of every possible outcome of the future, and the nuances of change with every move she makes.
She has also been described as a being of peace, built for war. She entered the land killing people. The decision might depend upon the way she wants to bring about peace, and the role she wants to play. (or maybe I missed how she wants to do that, I may have to re-read?)
My gut feel would be for her to listen to Limirrus's feelings, get his input, and involve him in her decision upon where to go. Whether or not the warrior's input is well informed or not, the reasons for this would be psychological - he could lose his self esteem in her presence after a while, and she may need a useful ally on the ground later on in the story, and he needs to be 150% mentally and physically prepared.
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Argon18
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| Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2006 4:08 am Post subject: |
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I'd do a combination of what Din and Crunchyfrog suggested. Listen both to the woods and to Limirrius since the threads that Rae is trying to repair sound delicate and require subtle shifts in events to weave back together.
The woods probably would give the sense of the pattern that's being disturbed and Limirrius would probably give more insight on the catalyst needed to repair it.
_________________
Pressure makes Diamonds over Time
*A*R*G*O*N*
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Kalanna Rai
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| Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2006 12:46 pm Post subject: |
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Poll is up, there can now be voting. YAY!
_________________
"It's not just about living forever...the trick is living with yourself forever..."
"Music makes you braver."
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Crunchyfrog
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| Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 3:47 am Post subject: |
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Kewl!
I've submitted my vote. I'm going for listening to the woods and Limmirrus. 
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